I
t’s Friday morning and a cold shower in the Mirhav Hotel reminds me of the not so distant past when a hot shower in the morning seemed like a far-away mirage. Fortunately it is just a matter of a phone call to the reception desk and life is back to normal.
We are in Goris. On the way to Meghri, this is our usual overnight stay at the Mirhav Hotel. Goris is beautiful, as always. I think this is the most beautiful city in Armenia. It has a lot of potential and a good mayor would probably turn this city into a real booming regional center with streets and architecture that make sense and a vibrant community that cares. But, just like everywhere else, there is a lot to do. And there are not many people who care, at least not enough.
We have asked Artashes, the leader of the Goris based Teaching and Partnership NGO to join us during this trip. We partnered with Teaching and Partnership NGO to mobilize the Alvank and Shvanidzor communities and they have organized community meetings there and helped the communities set up their water management boards.
The community mobilization is the most important component of our Bringing Water to Syunik’s Border Villages project as this will ensure the sustainability of the project and will secure that the community will take ownership of its resources.
This time it was harder to reach Meghri, as the road was partly covered with snow and ice and it was a bit more difficult to cross our usual three mountain ranges. With careful low gear and slow pace we arrived in Meghri ready for a meeting with the community water management boards and the community administrations.
Shvanidzor was our first destination and with the nice sunny weather we decided to move the meeting outside and enjoy the last bits of sun while talking about communal responsibility and water management procedures.
Shvanidzor has a population of 349 and has never collected fees for the water. Despite that, during our meeting the members of the water management board were sure that the introduction of fees for the water would not be a problem as everyone in the community understands that keeping chahrez functioning takes finances and effort. Prior to our meeting the water management board worked on the overall annual plan of water management and provided the community administration with the result. According to the plan the community administration should start collecting 500 drams (almost $1.5) per household per month starting January 2010. This amount should be incrementally increased throughout the year. The head of the community administration did not have any objections to the fees but was arguing that there should be a sliding scale as it is not fair to charge a 500 AMD fee for a household of seven and the same amount for a household that has only two members. Other than that he agreed that the fees would help the community to budget the annual expenses and ensure the funds for maintenance and clean ups. The water management board and the community leader agreed that it was time to convene a community meeting to inform the community about the plans and ongoing projects. After setting the date for the meeting, and Arteshes trying to meet again with the board and the community administration, we left for Alvank, thinking that we are half-way through, although keeping this mechanism together and letting it grow and settle is important.
When we arrived in Alvank the board was already at the community administration, arguing about the amount of the fee to be charged from the households. Tempers were running high and sometimes it seemed that people are repeating the same arguments over and over again. There was a definite change in the attitude of the board. This used to be a group of people who gathered together to see “what’s new”, now they were fully involved talking about different issues from fees to budgets.
The community board and community administration started by charging 300AMD (almost 80 cents) per household and plan to increase the fee to 600AMD (almost $1.6) as of January 2010, with the intention of increasing it again to 1,000AMD (almost $3) in the future. This will be sufficient to keep an on-staff water management employee who will ensure that different districts of the community are fairly supplied with water and will have the budget for annual chahrez maintenance procedures. Both the board and the community administration agreed that this is a positive step forward.
The issue that the board and the administration are faced with in this community is the low number of actually inhabited households. Out of 133 households 55 are abandoned and neighbors are tending the gardens of these houses for additional income using the water for irrigation purposes and paying the same flat fee for the water. This creates water shortages in some parts of the community as one household irrigates three or four gardens while another household does not have enough water to use in the kitchen. The issue is delicate and the board and the community administration must be careful not to deprive people of their income on the one hand and on the other hand they need to ensure that there is a fair distribution of the water in the community.
One of the board members was arguing that all the households that are not inhabited currently should pay a higher rate as their water is used for irrigation only. There is a lot to work out in this community. The board and the community administration will meet regularly to put together an approach that would satisfy the community – be it stricter regulation of the time and water amounts that will be used for irrigation by the households that are not inhabited, or higher fees and specific timeframe per day for irrigation, or some other approach.
On our way out we argued that the board members should have more patience as some of them were yelling during the argument, understanding that we would need almost the same amount of patience and perseverance to see the Alvank water management board succeed.
The community water management board of Alvank will continue meeting regularly to iron out the wrinkles and put together a long term plan for water maintenance for the community. Artashes, our community mobilizer, after the meeting, was telling us how difficult it was to get the members of the board all involved and caring. He says he gradually sees that there is a difference in attitude.
Understanding that by empowering the water management boards we are creating a new culture and atmosphere in these communities, we took off promising to do everything possible to drive this initiative home.